1. Technical Field
The invention relates in general to a method and system for selecting objects displayed on a tablet using a pen-like pointing device and particularly to a method and system for selecting an object from among a large number of objects on a tablet.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are systems known in the art which allow a desired object to be selected from among a plurality of objects displayed on a screen (e.g., icon, etc.). Such objects are displayed on a predetermined portion of the screen by a tapping operation that brings the point of a stylus (pen) into contact the predetermined portion on a tablet. It is also known that a predetermined area containing a predetermined portion indicated by a stylus is partially displayed in an enlarged form (zoom in) so that a specific object can be easily selected from among a large number of displayed objects to be selected.
For example, JA PUPA (Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application) 57-41731 discloses a coordinate input device which reads graphic objects, stores its image data in a storage device, displays the image data stored in the storage device on a display, and inputs the coordinates of a specific position of an image on the screen of said display. Taking a position predetermined on the screen of a display as the center, the image in a fixed area is enlarged and stored in the graphic memory (so-called dot plane), and is displayed along with the coordinates of said specific position which are inputted by using the displayed image in an enlarged form.
In addition, JA PUPA 59-57336 discloses a technique which displays an enlarged image in response to an image enlargement signal and inputs the coordinates of an arbitrary position in an enlarged image. Furthermore, JA PUPA 59-57336 discloses a keyboard device which has a key display section displayed with dot matrix. When a stylus is in contact with the display section, the key displayed at the contact point is enlarged to a size large enough for operator manipulation. Other keys are displayed as small as possible in a range where the contents of the key top (characters indicated on the top of each key) can be identified visually.
In the prior art techniques, the area to be displayed in an enlarged form must be determined in accordance with the coordinates of the portion where the stylus is in contact on the screen before the display is carried out in an enlarged form. Thus, the display in said region is to be scrolled at a high speed whenever the operator moves the stylus along the plane to indicate a specific object, etc. in the region displayed in an enlarged form. Therefore, the prior art technique is disadvantageous because it is difficult to select a specific portion in said displayed region in an enlarged form by pointing to it.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method and system for selecting objects on a screen wherein any object may be easily selected from among a large number of displayed objects.